


Enough Room

by bastarddotcom



Category: Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: But what else is new?, Crying, Domestic, First Time, Getting Together, M/M, Pining, Post-Canon, South Downs Cottage (Good Omens), crowley's a fucking mess, no one knows how to talk to each other, you know sometimes you just want to have a good time
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-27
Updated: 2020-04-02
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:41:13
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,564
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21576982
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bastarddotcom/pseuds/bastarddotcom
Summary: "‘Sometime in the next decade,’ had turned into ‘sometime next week,’ and ‘sometime next week’ was quickly becoming ‘sometime tomorrow.’ More often than not Crowley found himself watching Aziraphale talk fretfully as he puttered about his shop, or watching Aziraphale talk through a mouthful of dinner, or watching Aziraphale flap his hands about some affront to literature as they strolled through the park. The more he watched, the harder it got to be for Crowley to pretend that watching was enough."
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 18
Kudos: 93





	1. Chapter 1

Crowley liked old movies, though they weren’t really old in the grand scheme of things. He liked watching stupid, screaming people run towards their doom, especially if doom was shaped like a rubber lizard suit. He liked close-ups on eyes, fake plastic terror. He could practically hear the tight-fisted director shaking their head in shame. The Serpent of Eden sipped his cognac happily and wiggled deeper into his inhuman sprawl. He looked over at The Guardian of the Eastern Gate, who had his feet tucked into the cushions of Crowley’s sofa, eyes fixed on the screen and sweating.

“Alright, angel?” said Crowley.

“Quite,” he said, glancing at Crowley and straightening up. He went to put his glass on the coffee table, but stopped and scoffed before pointedly conjuring up a coaster. “I can’t understand why these people won’t simply call the authorities, there must be some kind of… pest control system around. Or even pick up some kind of pipe or something! A poker, an iron, or anything! The household of the 1950s was rife with dangers to be used to one’s advantage. And while we’re at it, why don’t those two,” he pointed at the young man gripping the young woman by the waist and pulling her out of the way of some kind of swamp-themed danger, "simply talk about their feelings. He’s practically in tears about her in every scene! If they would just clobber the poor creature and have a good sit down this film could have been over half an hour ago.”

“Sounds a bit violent,” said Crowley. “What would pest control do to the seven foot crocodile, exactly?”

“They must have tranquilizers. Cattle prods. For bears, mountain lions. It’s America, Crowley.”

“Mm,” said Crowley, barely swallowing laughter with his cognac.

“He ate the dog, Crowley.”

“Mm!” he conceded. “Don’t worry, angel, they cage him in the end. And worse, the boy does get the girl. They do one of those censor-friendly closed-mouth kisses, you’ll love it.”

Aziraphale looked at him with the exhaustion that only 6,000 years of friendship can give you.

“This movie is over 50 years old, angel.”

Aziraphale took Crowley’s empty glass out his hand and got up to go to the kitchen. “Sometimes you make it hard to forget you’re a demon,” he grumbled.  
Crowley giggled in delight to the sounds of Aziraphale spitefully doing the dishes. He didn’t think they’d ever have this, never thought he’d be able to tell the difference in sound from Aziraphale doing dishes spitefully or otherwise. If, a few times a week he could quietly pretend that this feeling, that feeling of fond sadism met by fond exasperation, was his to keep, well that was more than he had ever dreamed of. He smiled into the plastic eyes of the monster on the screen as it howled in pain, and then the lights came on.

“You’re taking me to dinner,” said Aziraphale from the doorframe.

He laughed aloud, and if the commanding tone gave him a little thrill, then who had to know?

Look, if places are busy then they’re busy. He can free up a table, but if the place is crowded, Crowley could hardly just miracle everyone to the moon, could he? Not in front of the angel, at least. And so they were pressed hip to hip to the throng of people talking and laughing in the little tapas place Aziraphale had insisted on trying. It was the kind of place that believed in low lighting, communal tables. So if a drunk bachelorette party elbowed them to the back of the room, and they ended up in a dark corner, if they were forced to bend near to hear each other, if Crowley had to stand close to see Aziraphale’s eyes properly, and if their hands touched as they picked from the same plate… it was hardly his fault, was it? It had been Aziraphale’s idea anyway, and he didn’t seem bothered. Crowley looked down at Aziraphale as he wiped away an errant drop of beer and licked his finger.

“Do you remember what beer used to be like, dear? It was like bread, liquid, moldy bread. Horrible stuff. And now they have IPAs, and pale ales, and chocolate stouts!”

“Hm,” suggested Crowley. He realized that he was staring. Aziraphale was pretty when he enthused. It was so dark in their corner that he couldn’t possibly be able to see Crowley’s eyes behind his glasses, so he supposed there was no harm in watching the way the angel’s mouth moved, so close to him as he was now.

“It can be a bit fanciful, I’ll allow, but I appreciate the innovation. They really have come a long way. Turning what was a means to an end into a delicacy. Do you remember when you couldn’t drink the water in London? We had to have beer instead. And now it has overtones, undertones, hints of,” he flipped the menu over.

“Honey and sage. And it’s eleven pounds.”

Just then an American teenager stumbled drunkenly toward the bathroom behind them, just missing the door before spitting vomit dangerously close to Crowley’s shoes. He jumped out of the way, bumping into Aziraphale and pushing him into the corner. “Oi!” he shoved the kid back and sent him by the shoulders toward the door. “Behold the great innovators,” he said.

Aziraphale was warm and solid against his side. “’Scuse me, angel.”

Aziraphale made a noise like “not to worry,” and smiled at him with a sudden wistfulness that Crowley didn’t quite understand.

Crowley backed up slightly. “Seems like a lot of faff to me,” he said.

“Isn’t it nice to have the time for a bit of faff, though?” said Aziraphale.

He didn’t know what to say to that that wasn’t a joke that would make Aziraphale blush, and if he saw Aziraphale blush at this proximity he thought he might lose consciousness. They were so close, and it was warm and dark, and quiet between them in the way that only a room full of talking people can make it. It would be so, so easy to bend his neck and take the taste of that beer from his mouth. He’d push his hand to the angel’s face, up into his curls, and kiss him there against the wall. Hook their legs together and fall into that softness. So, so easy. No one would even mind them.

“’Spose,” he said, instead.

“Well,” said Aziraphale. “Time for dinner then?”

“We’ve just eaten!”

Aziraphale looked at him as if he had said something impossibly stupid. The way he was pressing his lips together on one side made Crowley feel greedy.

“Well pick somewhere in walking distance, for Satan’s sake. If we’re going to be out in the cold all night I refuse to sober up.”

Aziraphale smiled. “What do you say to ramen?”

To Crowley’s surprise, the ramen house was small and crowded as well, all fluorescents and Styrofoam bowls. The woman at the counter seemed to recognize Aziraphale, and wordlessly upsized his order without charging them. They ended up sitting at the bar facing the window, and they watched the sky threaten snow as they ate. The steam from the soup was making Aziraphale’s nose turn red.

Crowley couldn’t help noticing that they weren’t at the Ritz, or the Savoy, or anything like it. They were here, where they knew Aziraphale’s order, and what size to give him. He hadn’t even dissected the menu like he usually did. He walked straight up to the counter and rattled off specific instructions, and the woman nodded without writing them down, obviously having memorized them. Crowley didn’t have time to say anything other than, “Erm, the same,” before they were whisked to the side for the next in line.

“Come here often, angel?”

“Hmlp?” he slurped.

“They seem to know you.”

He swallowed. “Oh, yes,” he said cheerfully. “I’ve been a regular for quite some time. They knew my, ah, father, you know? And my grandfather. Not a lot of ramen in London.”

“Oh. Why haven’t I been here before, then?”

He huffed. “Really, my dear, it can’t be all nights at the Ritz. We dine together so regularly now, I supposed there’s no reason to stand on ceremony.”  
Crowley squinted at his plastic spoon. He had always assumed that that was just how Aziraphale ate: hedonistically, decadently. Perhaps not the Ritz every night, but ten minutes ago he had hardly imagined Aziraphale knew what Styrofoam was. That he chose to suggest beautiful places, chandeliers and pianos, when they were together precisely because they were together, wasn’t something he had really considered.

The ramen was really quite good, and Crowley supposed it did fall under the category of ‘interesting little restaurants where they know you,’ but the sight of Aziraphale’s toothmarks left in the side of the cup made Crowley feel like he’d stepped into the Twilight Zone.  
Aziraphale looked back up at Crowley, face flushed and eyes watering slightly from the heat. “Well then. Warmed up enough for a lift home? And perhaps a nightcap if you’re amenable?”

"'Course," he choked.

‘Sometime in the next decade,’ had turned into ‘sometime next week,’ and ‘sometime next week’ was quickly becoming ‘sometime tomorrow.’ More often than not Crowley found himself watching Aziraphale talk fretfully as he puttered about his shop, or watching Aziraphale talk through a mouthful of dinner, or watching Aziraphale flap his hands about some affront to literature as they strolled through the park. He watched as Aziraphale railed in barely hushed tones about the merits and sins of each painting in the Tate. He watched Aziraphale stoop to pluck a coin out of a child’s ear, and then watched Aziraphale mope about how unsurprised the child had been. It was getting to be painful, watching. Pressed in crowds and tucked in corners next to him. The more he watched, the harder it got to be for Crowley to pretend that watching was enough.


	2. Chapter 2

Honestly, Crowley was  _ not  _ warmed up enough for the ride home. London was nearly convinced about snowing now, and however much he glared at the sky it remained resolved. He felt his nose begin to drip.

Aziraphale was smiling at everyone and everything as they walked back to the Bentley. Most shop windows were still lit after the holiday season, left up by wistfulness or laziness, casting golds and whites onto the bustling streets. Crowley tried very hard not to notice the mood this had put the angel in. He was practically floating. 

Aziraphale tucked his mittened hands into his jacket happily, watching the passing crowd like an artist watching a gallery opening. Friends and lovers stumbled out of bars, shrieking with laughter and exclamations about snow. An old woman was helping her wife into a taxi outside of a theatre, nodding patiently at her wife's exhuberations about the evening. A child in a passing pram was bundled up so tightly that her face was squished into dough. Aziraphale looked up at the sky and gave a delighted little shiver.

Crowley hated the cold; it made his joints ache. He was glaring hard at the sky, feeling the season-long frustration settling itself into his stomach. He had a mind to sleep until March. 

“Looks like snow, don’t you think?”

When he turned back to Aziraphale they had reached the Bentley. He had a hand to his chest, face nearly glowing, content and slightly drunk off of the love in the air. Crowley reached between them and opened the passenger door. “You’d just  _ love  _ that, wouldn’t you?” he said.

"I would!" said Aziraphale, smiling, and closed the door as he sat.

As Crowley walked to the driver's side he shot a conceding look up at the sky. Soft, Dickensian snowflakes immediately began to fall. 

"Oh, look!" cried Aziraphale as Crowley's door slammed shut. "Oh, isn't that  _ lovely _ !"

"Mm," said Crowley. He leaned over and squinted out Aziraphale's window. "Just mud waiting to happen, you know."

Aziraphale turned, lips parted for a retort. Crowley realized suddenly that he had slid practically thigh to thigh with him, both pressed close to the window. Aziraphale exhaled, and his breath warmed Crowley’s face. The angel had lips to tempt a saint, full and expressive. They quirked in mirth, wobbled in disappointment, and now twitched with some emotion that Crowley couldn’t parse. He found himself staring at them, pink and chapped from the cold, but still, Crowley thought, they would be so, so soft. He knew this was too much, too close, but wouldn’t it be easy? Would he still taste like miso, would his cheek be warm under Crowley’s hand? 

"Ah, um…" Aziraphale said softly. Crowley’s leather jacket, mortified, squeaked sharply as he withdrew his arm and started the ignition. He pulled out onto the street and London began to streak by the windows, white and gold, and starting to shine.

\---

Alright. Red lights are red lights and even if you are, historically, the reason for most traffic safety laws, and even if you can cheat a bit and simply expect the light to remain green, sometimes a red light is a red light, and there's nothing to be done about that.

Aziraphale cleared his throat. “Er, Crowley--”

Crowley slapped the power button on the stereo. For the first time in decades The Velvet Underground actually played. “Pale Blue Eyes” sat between them like a third party, soft tamborine making Crowley’s heart shudder with dread. It was over. The way Aziraphale had looked at him. He knew, how could he not? Crowley could only imagine what he himself had looked like, breathing all over the angel, wanting clearly written all over his face. Anything the angel had to say would be kind, understanding, distant. A tight smile meant to hide disgust, he could see it now, a hurried, cold forgiveness. Crowley watched the snow gather on the hoods of the cars around them, feeling the cold gripping his bones.

“Crowley.” It was practically a whisper. He glanced over. The taillights of the car ahead of them lit Aziraphale's face, harsh red pulling him out of the dark. He was so, so beautiful.

“What is it, angel?” he aimed for peevish but missed in the direction of terrified.

“I think--” he faltered, swallowing.

“Come  _ on _ , angel. It’s not as though you didn’t already know. Surely. To some degree. You must’ve. But I had, you know, deniability. I thought, well if he can ignore it I can too. But it was getting difficult,” he said, “these days.”

“What was?” he said.

For the first time Crowley really looked him in the eye. “Ignoring this! It! You know,” he gestured around them, between them, at himself. “This! When we’re in a crowded bar together, or an elevator, or just, you know. Together. Somewhere. That!”

Aziraphale licked his lip. “See, when you say ‘this’--”

Crowley scowled at him. “You really are a bastard sometimes, you know that?”

The bookshop rose ahead of them. Crowley sighed as they pulled up to the curb. “I guess I’ll see you in a decade or two, hm? Feel a nap coming on.” He waited for Aziraphale to step out, waited for a curt goodbye, perhaps a relieved one, to be shuffled off until they could pretend that everything was forgotten. He waited.

“What the  _ Hell  _ are you doing?” said Aziraphale. “Oh look,” he said, snapping his fingers, “a parking spot.” And suddenly the Bentley was backed in, with the parking brake on, and both doors clicked locked.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  



	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a touch of body dysmorphia in the middle there, as a heads up. We all get sad in the bath, but all will be well.

_ Yesterday _

Crowley closed the door behind him. His flat was dark, quiet. He liked it that way, and it was really the most “lair” of lairs he’d had over the years. Very Batman, very Bond villain. It lent itself to brooding, soliloquizing; he had installed blinds perfect for peering through pessimistically, a perfect view of a grey, hard city. He had picked up smoking cigarettes in the mid-50s for the purpose of leaving them half-smoked in an ashtray on his desk, or dropping them into people’s coffee. He now only kept it up occasionally for something to do, or to yellow the wallpaper.

He stalked through the flat, scowling at various plants as he passed. He inhaled deeply. “Alexa, play playlist ‘be seeing you.’” Ironically, Hell’s wiretapping skills hadn’t caught up to Amazon’s, and Billie Holiday began to croon without threat of interruption. Not that they had dared in the last few months. He smirked at the memory of Aziraphale trying on his skin in the flat the night after the Not-opolypse. 

“How’s this?” Aziraphale had said, slouching and lolling his neck cartoonishly. “‘Dagon, me old dude--”

“‘Me old dude’?”

“‘Beelzebub, your rascally-ness.’ Oh, Crowley how casual are you with these people? Good Lord, is there court etiquette in Hell? How do you address a duke again, is it ‘your grace’ or ‘your excellence’? I don’t want to seem rude.”

Crowley had just looked at him, cheek plastered to the sofa’s leather armrest. Looked at himself, really, but the way Aziraphale wore his body was so unmistakably Aziraphale that he hardly recognized it. A demon’s body had never seen better posture. 

“Good, right,” he said, getting to his feet. “We’re fucked. It was a good run but I think I’ll go see if there’s a drop or two of holy water left.”

That had sent Aziraphale into a tizzy, calling him a serpent and a fiend. They spent the rest of that night arguing over hip-swaying and turns of phrase (“I will buy you breakfast, lunch, and dinner at the Ritz if you swear to never say ‘dude’ again.”), and eventually they just collapsed, exhausted and a bit hysterical, back onto the sofa.

“Crowley?” he’d heard after a time.

“Mmf.”

“Do you think it’ll work?”

“Mm. It’s got to, doesn’t it? All we got. And if it doesn’t...”

“Then it was a good run.”

“Hmm.” He sighed, turning to see himself staring back, a hand between them on the sofa. The look in his own eyes was all Aziraphale. Looking, pleading for Crowley to fix it all. He took the hand between them. “S’alright, angel,” he murmured. Platonic enough, he thought, despite the turning in his stomach. 

They’d sat like that for a good while, saying nothing, neither of them willing to pull away.

Now, months later, Crowley stood looking at the couch. Somehow, strangely, carrying out their plan had been less complicated than the weeks following it. Survival was straightforward, obvious, once they had the mechanism for it. Having survived was much more nebulous. They’d had lunch that day, and the day after that. And then dinner, and a nightcap after that. The more they spent time together, the harder it was to ignore the fact that  _ this  _ was the world he had been trying to save. Not wine or cellphones, the little world they shared together in the back of the bookshop or the corner of a cafe. Now that they had saved it, secured it, it was that much more precious, that much more fragile. After all that, if he risked it all on something so trivial as his  _ feelings _ … It was too ridiculous to think about. So he went to take a bath.

The bathroom was less Bond-like: dark green tiles, a grey rubber shower curtain, a granite counter cluttered with various pills and potions that weren’t strictly necessary for an ultraterrestrial being outside of biology, physics, and gender. Certainly gender.

He lay his glasses down on the corner of the sink and snapped the tap to the right temperature (volcanic) with his fingers. He took his clothes off the human way, they were too expensive to accidentally send to oblivion--he’d lost a favorite pair of Louboutins that way. He paused and stared at himself in the mirror, undressed, steam rising. Him, in his own body. No matter what it looked like, it would always be him in there, behind those eyes. He dabbed lotion under them abscently. He wondered how it had felt for Aziraphale, wearing this body. He had never had problems with it, even if the spine was a little springy and the legs a little lanky, but he hadn’t known what he was missing before he had worn Aziraphale’s corporation. 

Aziraphale’s body had been unbearably soft. Crowley had taken stock of all that he could. He had run his hands over the thighs, through ridiculous trousers, looked to see if the knees were ticklish--they were. Put his hand to the belly, feeling how warm and solid he was there. He’d scratched the back of the neck, surreptitiously memorizing the feel of the curls at the nape. Everything was so sinfully soft but the hands, which were cracked around the cuticles from working and worrying, though platinum body hair betrayed his divinity. They were strong hands, made for holding a sword, but used for carrying boxes of Oxfam discoveries, flipping yellowed pages, holding silly mugs. 

Crowley shuddered and snapped the tap off. Sprinkled a few drops of oil into the tub, filling his nose with eucalyptus. He settled into the steaming water up to his nose, watching his toes like a crocodile, long hair fanning about him. Crowley wasn’t soft at all, he was jagged. Ill-fitted. Boney feet, knobbly knees. He wondered if Aziraphale had been as uncomfortable in his corporation as Crowley had been enraptured by Aziraphale’s.

He cracked his toes. Reached up and fumbled on the counter for a hair tie. He’d left the door ajar, and Billie Holiday echoed from the speaker in the next room. He closed his eyes and let his head drift under the water, listening to the piano stroll beside Holiday’s voice.

_ Good morning heartache, here we go again _

_ Good morning heartache, you're the one who knew me when _

_ Might as well get used to you hanging around _

_ Good morning heartache, sit down _

Another hour of this was enough to well and truly pickle him somber. He emerged, toweled himself off, and decided that as long as he was already in the neighborhood of self-pity, he might as well have a wank. He wrapped the towel around his waist and went to turn off the hall lights, turning the music down in passing, checking the shadows for imagined intruders.

He flipped through his mental rolodex of fantasies as he padded about the flat. Aziraphale stretched out on his sofa, warm and pliant. Aziraphale pushed up against the door, stammering and blushing. Aziraphale bent over in the kitchen, pleading and needy. Aziraphale in the plant room, awed and--

The doorbell buzzed.

“Shit,” he startled, turning and pushing the button to answer. “Fuck, what?”

“Um, my dear…” came a voice.

He gripped the towel tighter around him. “Angel!”

“Yes, hello. Sorry, I only thought to call ahead when I was nearly here, so, um.”

“S’alright, what’s wrong?” he said. “Come up, come up.” He pushed a second button and dashed to the bedroom, hopping into a pair of jeans awkwardly. He only had just found a tshirt when a knock came, and he tripped back to the hall straightening himself.

Aziraphale through the peephole, worried and small. He flung the door open.

“Angel, what is it? Get in here,” he pulled his friend in by the arm, eyes darting across the hallway behind him. “Did someone follow you? What’s happened?”

“Oh,” Aziraphale was saying. “No no, I’m dreadfully sorry, oh dear.” He somehow seemed more nervous now he was inside. “Nothing’s happened, I’m fine, everything’s tip top, not to worry. I just… you know, I was reading, and I thought perhaps--”

Crowley looked back at him, face softening by degrees. He let out a breath. “Reading. Do you have any idea what time it is?”

“Ah,” said Aziraphale.

“Because if you’ve come at the fucking witching hour to give me a lecture about Keats or something I swear I’ll scream.” 

“No, no. I was just, you know, reading, and thinking. Just thinking, and…” he trailed off. The silence pulled the music out of the background.

_ And when the night is new _

_ I'll be looking at the moon _

_ But I'll be seeing you _

Crowley snapped his fingers so forcefully the whole speaker popped, likely broken. 

“Did I disturb you?” He sniffed, reddening. “Oh I’m dreadfully sorry, were you in the bath? I’ll--I’ll just toddle on, nothing important, my dear. I’ll leave you to it, dreadfully sorry, honestly.” He reached for the doorknob.

“Angel, what  _ is  _ it? Come on, it’s alright,” he shuffled him inside to the kitchen table. “Just, sit a minute. Startled me is all.” He sighed, conjuring up two glasses and a bottle of scotch between them. “Go on, angel. It’s alright. Keats better have something good to say, though.”

“I mean,” said Aziraphale, visibly relaxing as Crowley poured the scotch. “John Keats did have a fair few good things to say, I can tell you.” He smiled. “‘Bright star, how steadfast thou art,’ and all that.” He glanced up at Crowley, looking for something.

“Mm, ‘spose,” he said, scrunching his nose. “‘Pillow’d upon my fair love’s ripening breast,’ though. Bit visceral for me.” 

“Well--,” said Aziraphale. Crowley could see that he was about to say something about juxtaposition, and then thought better of it. Crowley hid his smile in his glass. “Anyway, Crowley, that’s not what I came to speak with you about. I’ve had something on my mind for… quite some time now, and, you know, when I really sat down to  _ think _ … I, maybe thought that you--I thought I felt, you know…” He fell silent again.

Crowley sipped his scotch. “You might consider finishing a sentence now and then.” 

Aziraphale glanced at him, annoyed, but couldn’t seem to find the words. 

“Did you feel me awake? Over, you know,” he twiddled his fingers. “Whatsit. I’m fine, just having a bath.”

“At three in the morning?”

“They say demons are most active at three in the morning, did you hear that? They say it’s to mock the holy trinity.”

“Who says that?” Aziraphale said, derailed.

“‘Paranormal investigators.’”

“Oh, how odd.”

“If only they knew what I got up to at three in the afternoon, eh?” he waggled his eyebrows.

“Napping in my place of business?” smirked Aziraphale.   
  


“Mm. Mortal sin, sloth.”

“Very devious, my dear.” Aziraphale’s smile wobbled with a desperation that Crowley couldn’t quite understand. “I did. Feel you awake, that is. And I felt that maybe, you might be thinking too.”

Crowley swallowed his scotch purposefully, pushing Billie Holiday melodies out of his mind. “You know I don’t make a habit of it.”

“I don’t believe that,” Aziraphale said softly.

He’d always been able to feel the angel’s aura if he pushed out and tried. And he did, more often than he’d like to admit, just to feel that he was alright. He was, usually, boring and stuffy. Every now and then he’d be being held at gunpoint, so he checked Aziraphale’s aura like he’d checked the corners of his apartment, habitually. He’d often wondered if it worked both ways, if Aziraphale could feel him as clearly, but it only occurred to him now that Aziraphale might catch his aura doing something… lascivious. Maybe he had been for years. Crowley had been thinking, erm, compromising things for long enough. Maybe tonight was too loud, maybe Aziraphale had come to ask him to stop, politely disgusted. He cleared his throat, panic rising.

“It’s true! Not a thought in my head for years now, promise. Did you know that uh, next door, I got a new neighbor. Really lonely neighbor seems like, really pathetic. Most pathetic ever maybe. I can feel them over there, being, you know, pathetic. Clouds up the whole neighborhood.” He tried a condescending laugh but it came out manic. “Top up?” He tried to refill Aziraphale’s glass before noticing that it hadn’t been touched. “Um.”

“They must be terribly lonely to be giving off such a signal.” Aziraphale was watching him.

“Mm. Like a bloody siren of self-pity. Real downer.”

“I don’t think so,” said Aziraphale. “I’m sure, whatever’s bothering them, there’s an easy solution.”

Crowley huffed.

“Anywhere, when there’s someone that lonely, there must be someone just as lonely not too far off.” Aziraphale’s eyes could grip him as tightly as those strong hands might. Crowley glanced down at them; they were trembling, ever so slightly, visible only because they were sitting so close. He was overcome with the urge to miracle the table bigger to force some distance. He wasn’t allowed to be thinking about hands right now, not if this miserable need could be felt across half of London.

“There’s websites for that,” he said half-heartedly, desperately.

“Crowley.”

“How long has my neighbor been bothering you anyway?” He tried for casual.

“It’s never  _ bothered _ me,” said Aziraphale. “But I’ve felt it, here and there, for a while now.”

“You never brought it up before.”

“Yes, well. I was thinking about time. We’ve seen plenty of it, and the changes it makes. We’ve seen lifetimes go by, you and I. And I was thinking, it all slips by so quickly, it’s easy to miss opportunities. And I’d like to stop that.”

Crowley stared at him. “Look, I stopped time only that once and it truly knackered me, so--”

“No, not the  _ time,”  _ said Aziraphale. “The missing. Of it. Opportunities. I think we ought to take advantage of more of them. Together.” 

“Alright,” said Crowley, lost. 

“Good then, I’m glad that’s settled,” said Aziraphale, relieved. “Really not much has to change, though there’s a few things I’d like to try. Coming over here more often, for a start.” He looked around the kitchen. “What do you even keep in those cabinets? You don’t eat.”

“I eat!” said Crowley. Then, “Booze, mostly.”

“I shouldn’t wonder. Have you got a television?”

“Why--”

“Did you know you can play whole films on them? Even the old ones, practically anything. Remarkable what humanity gets up to when you have your head down.”

“What kind of films?”

“Everything! It’s really something, my dear. Do you not have ‘Streaming’?”

“I have Netflix if that’s what you mean. What kind of films were you thinking about?”

“No particular titles in mind, perhaps we could start with something you like? I have a bit of catching up to do, I fear. How about tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow?”

“Today, I suppose. But later, maybe before dinnertime. Are you not available?”

“No no, I suppose I could uh, make some time,” He rubbed the back of his neck. 

“Thank you,” said Aziraphale, smiling. 

“And my uh, neighbor won’t bother you too much?” He watched Aziraphale’s smile, how it crinkled his eyes.

“I assure you, it’s not an issue, my dear,” he said. He was standing up, and Crowley felt suddenly stranded. He followed him to the door like a ghost. “I’ll come by after I’ve closed the shop.”

“Alright then,” he said, after a time. “Six?”

“Better call it five, for dinner after.”

“Right.”

“Till then, then!” said. “Toodle pip!” And toddled down the hall.

Crowley locked the door behind him. Turned. Looked at himself in the mirror. Turned, almost opened the door to shout after him. Turned back to look into the darkened flat. “Well,” he said. “‘Toodle pip _.’” _ He grabbed a pair of scissors from the hall table and began pruning. “ _ Toodle pip.”  _

A young peperomia began to tremble. He pressed his finger into its soil to check the moisture, sneering back up at it. “And I thought I was pathetic.” 

“‘Not an issue’?” he flicked the dirt at the calathea peevishly. “What’s not an issue? That I’m  _ radioactively  _ in love with him? That every time I get a bit moonish it wakes up half of London? Not an issue. As you were.” He ripped new pups out from under a harried-looking bromeliad. “‘Sorry old chap, but I’ve come across the city in the dead of night to tell you that your hard-on is distracting me from my reading. Never you mind, see you tomorrow for dinner!’ GAH.” He reeled on a fiddle leaf fig, wiggling his scissors at some perfectly healthy leaves before slumping, exhausted. “At least…” He jammed the scissors into the fiddle leaf’s soil, stalking back to the bedroom. “At least he’ll ignore it. I’ll just.” He sighed, catching sight of the broken speaker. It was nearing four AM by now. 

“I’ll just carry on loving him then. If he can ignore it, I can. I’ll just be quieter, somehow.” Though he wasn’t sure how the standard of six thousand years of perfect silence could not be quiet enough. Falling on the bed, he scrolled through movies on his phone, bookmarking ones he thought Aziraphale might like. Or at least dislike comically. Crowley pictured the day ahead, masochistically resolving to simply enjoy it. Silently. If Aziraphale wanted to spend more time together, great. It’s really what Crowley wanted to be doing anyway. And if Aziraphale wanted to be silent as the void about the need that Crowley had apparently seeping out of his skin, Crowley would give him silence. Buttoned up, vacuum locked. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woof! A slightly longer chapter, and not the one that you wanted! See you soon, friends! ;)


	4. Chapter 4

Ch 4

So, talking. Right. Crowley liked talking, by and large, especially if he didn’t have a lot to say. Ducks, dolphins, ethical consumption, all good reasons for talking. But the front seat of the Bentley was very small, and Aziraphale was turning  _ that  _ specific shade of red, and it was obvious he wouldn’t be able to slither his way out of Talking. 

“When you say ‘this,’” said Aziraphale firmly, “what do you mean?”

Crowley’s jaw locked tight. Perhaps there was still a way to wriggle out of this, he thought. Perhaps he’d been incoherent enough to pass for fully mad. He racked his brain for probable lies, tried for an offhand chuckle or two, but Aziraphale’s gaze bound him like a snake.

“By ‘this’,” ventured Aziraphale, “could you possibly be referring to what we discussed last night?”

“Nuh?” said Crowley. His stomach sank thinking of what Aziraphale must be picking up from him at this distance, if Crowley’s moonishness had drawn him all the way to Mayfair. He shuddered to think of his own tired old face, panting on his friend like a teenager. “Look--angel, I. Really. It’s--”

“Really, Crowley.” Aziraphale’s frustration was growing frantic. “I thought we were past this. I thought, last night, we understood each other.”

“Past it!” said Crowley. “It’s--I--Six thousand years, and one conversation and you expect me to be _past_ _it!_ ” 

Aziraphale’s eyebrows shot up. Too much, too much again, thought Crowley, but if Aziraphale could feel his need in the air there was no reason not to put it to words. He could feel the precipice of centuries without Aziraphale yawning before him. He might as well swan dive, if he was going to fall anyway.

_ “ _ Look, I know there’s no--there’s nothing more disgusting to you. Demon, eyes, I get it, but my heart isn’t made out of stone, angel.” His voice cracked, he closed his eyes against it. “I can’t just turn it off. I’ve tried, for years, but it doesn’t work that way. You’re just--I can’t just turn it off, angel. Just give me a while. I’ll figure something out, I’ll, I don’t know, get a lobotomy. I’ve been--I don’t know what you  _ expect  _ from me.”

When he opened his eyes Aziraphale was still looking at him, face twisted into some emotion Crowley couldn’t read. He didn’t know what would be worse, the years of loneliness, or the merciful but firm speech he was about to receive. 

“I’ve been as quiet as I can, angel,” he whispered, clamping down on his breaking heart. “You don’t know what you do to me.”

“Oh,” said Aziraphale. There was a squeak of leather and suddenly Aziraphale was close again, hand reaching. “Oh, my dear,” he whispered. And kissed his lips.

In the breath of a second between the press of his lips and watching Aziraphale reach for him, Crowley felt: grief, confusion, anger. But as the taste of his friend’s mouth reached his brain, all he could feel was the world being pulled out from under them. Aziraphale’s hand was holding tight to the back of his neck, as if he expected Crowley to float away. Crowley found his own hands gripping onto Aziraphale’s coat for dear life. When he tugged on Aziraphale’s lapel the angel  _ moaned,  _ sliding their bodies ever closer together, gripping, holding, pulling. When he felt the warmth of a tongue against his Crowley choked out, forcing himself back.

“Angel,” he breathed. “What the fuck.”

Aziraphale was watching his lips. “I thought that might be easier,” he said lowly. “The talking wasn’t working.”

He looked at him for a moment. Aziraphale couldn’t seem to let go of him. He had released his head but his hands fluttered on his shoulders, his forearms, smoothing down his hair. “When you said ‘opportunities’...” said Crowley.

“I didn’t quite mean,” Aziraphale interrupted himself, blushing. It was a devastating sight from Crowley’s angle. “Well, not immediately. I felt you, last night. I hadn’t before, ever. It felt like you were reaching out. At first I thought you might be in danger, but then I recognized the feeling. I didn’t believe it at first, I thought it just just, you know, me. Bouncing back.” He smoothed a thumb across Crowley’s cheek, hand shaking slightly. “But, it made me hope.”

“Uh,” said Crowley.

“So I went over, silly old angel tottering around and hoping. Panicking, really,” his face tightened. “And when I got there you were just, you.” He sighed. “Calming me down, even though I could feel my own panic and,” he swallowed, “need, mirrored in you. It was so strong. But you put it all aside to soothe me. I realized that, consuming and terrifying as this feeling is, there’s no reason to be afraid of it. It’s just us, as it always has been.”

Crowley puffed out a heavy breath, eyes stinging.

“I tried to say something. I thought you’d understood, even if I couldn’t bring myself to say anything definite. You weren’t ready to say anything either, I could see that, but I thought we’d understood each other, that we understood the feeling was mutual. Oh, darling.” He was cradling Crowley’s cheek now as he shook, tears flowing freely. “Oh my darling, I’m so sorry.”

“I thought you were telling me to stop,” said Crowley in a rush. “And I can’t, I couldn’t ever, angel--”

“Neither can I, neither can I, I don’t want to.” Aziraphale was kissing his cheeks, and his eyes, hands on his shoulders, gripping his jacket. “I don’t want to, Crowley.”

They were both shaking, caught somewhere between laughter and tears. Crowley watched Aziraphale glance toward the shop. The street light reflected in the snow shone against his misting eyes, deep blue shimmering. When those eyes turned back toward him Crowley thought his heart might give out.

“I do love you,” Aziraphale said.

Crowley whimpered and leaned back into him, catching his lips. “I’ve loved you all this time,” he whispered. “Did you know?”

“More or less.” It was barely a breath, but Aziraphale was smiling.

“Well.” And then they were kissing, falling into each other, falling and falling until, by whoever’s grace, Aziraphale’s back fell against the cushions of the sofa in the back room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh we're earning that rating next time, boys.


End file.
